A Parallel of the Antient Architecture with the Modern

1664

de Beer Ed 1664 F

London: Printed by Tho. Roycroft for John Place

With the aid of concrete the Romans built baths, amphitheatres, temples, aqueducts, bridges, basilicas, arches and roads, throughout their vast empire. Concrete enabled the Romans to build larger, more monumental buildings. Unlike stone, concrete did not need to be carved, it could be shaped when wet, and the materials needed to make it were easier to transport and it required less skill in construction. All in all, concrete was cheaper and quicker. Finished in 306 AD, Diocletian’s Baths were the largest imperial baths built in Rome. Of the three Greek orders of columns the Romans preferred the Corinthian, the most ornate, and as Fréart writes above ‘[the style] is not therefore to be employed but in great and publick Works…’ as it was in the Baths of Diocletian. The original of this engraving was drawn in 1574 by the Italian architect Pyrro Ligorio (1510-83).